St. Charles East shoots down Geneva
If he’s only going to take four shots, St. Charles East sophomore Kendall Stephens knows how to make the most of them.
With Illinois’ Bruce Weber in the stands, one of five coaches to offer him a scholarship, Stephens scored 14 points on those 4 field goal attempts. He made all four — three 3-pointers and the final attempt a breakaway slam in the closing seconds that provided the exclamation point on a 59-48 victory over visiting Geneva Friday night.
St. Charles East (10-10, 6-2) pulled into a tie with Elgin and St. Charles North for the Upstate Eight Conference River Division lead while evening its record at .500 for the first time this season.
The Saints are 6-1 since Christmas. Take away their 1-7 record in their two killer tournaments, at home at Thanksgiving and at York over Christmas, and St. Charles East is 9-3.
Coach Brian Clodi can’t say enough about the team’s work ethic and chemistry, which was on display again Friday.
While Geneva (10-15, 5-5) made Stephens a nonfactor most of the game with a box-and-one, guards Charlie Fisher and Spencer Motley stepped up with 16 and 14 points, respectively.
“Nobody cares who scores,” Clodi said. “They are fighting on defense. We are playing hard, we are playing smart. They all work together and good things happen.”
Despite shooting 36 percent from the field, Geneva pulled within 46-41 with four minutes left in the game on a second-chance basket by John Swiderski.
The Saints scored the next 6 points, all on free throws, to open a 52-41 cushion with 2:11 left. They made 14 of 17 free throws in the fourth quarter.
St. Charles East only had 2 field goals in the final quarter, one by Fisher off a steal and the other Stephens’ fastbreak slam over Geneva’s 6-foot-8 Dan Trimble, who had an emphatic dunk of his own in the second quarter. Stephens had another chance for a dunk on the next possession but instead dribbled the clock out.
“Their guards shot the heck out of the ball,” Geneva coach Phil Ralston said. “Their other guys stepped up. We essentially said beat us with their other players (besides Stephens) and they did.”
The Vikings took their only leads of the game midway through the first quarter. The second of Stephens’ back-to-back 3-pointers put the Saints ahead 8-6 and they never trailed again.
St. Charles East led 26-21 at halftime. The Vikings got as close as 30-29 on a 3-pointer by Dan Hince. Dan Ditusa answered with a 3-pointer for the Saints, one of the team’s 8 3-pointers.
Neither Motley or Johnny Hondlik started for the Saints after battling illness this week. Robert Chinn and Matt Ray took their places, and Ray drained a pair of 3-pointers in the first half to help open up the lead.
Motley didn’t look sick Friday, scoring 9 of his 14 points in the second half.
“Trimble changes a lot of shots,” Motley said. “We had to shoot well to win.”
While leading his team in scoring, Fisher was more pleased by spearheading a defense that forced 11 second-half turnovers.
“I was trying to go 100 percent all the time, not quit on any play,” Fisher said.
Three players reached double figures for Geneva. Hince and Trimble both scored 12 points and Brendan Leahy 10.
“For us it was just a lot of little things that made a big difference in this game,” Ralston said. “It’s really hard to fault our effort because the effort was there. We’ve got to keep people under 50 to have a chance.”
Trimble’s 15 rebounds paced Geneva’s 31-21 advantage. The Vikings became the 19th team in the Saints’ 20 games to outrebound St. Charles East, yet the Saints have found a way to battle back to .500 and earn their share of the conference lead.
“We always start out with that hard tournament, (then) Jack Tosh is always great teams there and we usually don’t do too well,” Motley said. “That always sets us back in the beginning. It’s really big we got back to .500.”